All that’s left of the leaves are the birds of autumn.
In truth I’ve lost sight of my beauty too.
I feel it beneath me purring in the leafy ground,
muddied inside the dark paradise of my life.
Such as the two far-flung basswood trees near a river
where I walked between them and shivered.
Standing beside them, the sky was a window
left opened, both my boys leaping through.
The tracks of their fragile wings left in the air.
My girl cartwheeling from one to the next,
looking back to see if I was following.